187 - The Spiritual Death of Jesus on the Cross [B]

The Spiritual Death of Jesus on the Cross
Matthew 27:45–49; Mark 15:33–36;
Luke 23:44–45a; John 19:25–30a
Matthew Lesson #187
February 11, 2018
www.deanbibleministries.org

Opening Prayer

“Father, thank You for Your Word. Thank You that it is a lamp unto our feet and a light into our path.

“Thank You for what it reveals to us about our salvation: that we must realize that the more we study it, the more we think about it, meditate on it, the more we probe its depths, not just in terms of what happened historically, but in terms of its significance to every human being, its significance and its impact in the universe, and its significance, especially in individual lives who are transformed by faith alone in Christ’s death on the Cross.

“Father, I pray that as we study today we might come to a greater understanding of that transaction that occurred on the Cross, as our sins were paid for, as redemption was accomplished, and the debt against us was canceled.

“We pray this in Christ’s name. Amen.”

Slide 2

Open your Bibles with me; initially we’re going to look at John 19, but we will also come back to Matthew 27. As we continue our study in Matthew, we’re in the section related to the crucifixion of Christ.

Several lessons back I begin to break this down into the various stages, the various events that occurred once the guilty verdict was pronounced. They led Jesus out from the Praetorium where He was tried by Pontius Pilate—the third of the civil trials—that at that point they led Him out to be crucified.

We began to work our way through what is said in the Synoptic Gospels and the Gospel of John to further understand the order of events and what is taking place.

Today, we come to the second three hours on the Cross. We have looked at the first three hours, where the wrath of man was spit out, was thrown at the Lord through the reviling, the blasphemy, other things that happened during those first three hours. But it came from man, it didn’t come from God.

Then we come to the time from 12 noon to 3 PM, when darkness covers the face of the earth, and this is when that divine transaction takes place: the payment for our sin.

We have one more thing in the previous section before we get into it, so we will start with number 17.

Slide 3

We looked at the first five stages, which involved the procession to Golgotha, from the Praetorium to Golgotha.

Slide 4

Then we came to the first three hours: the wrath of men.

Slide 5

One change from what I said last week: we talked about the four mockings of Jesus on the Cross, and that should be changed to five. What I discovered was that even though the word “mocking” isn’t used in this section, there is mocking that takes place: even though the word isn’t used, it’s definitely happening.

Slides 6 and 7

We’re going to go to eight mockings of Jesus, five mockings on the Cross.

Slide 8

We will look first at the last thing that happens before darkness comes, revealed in John 19:25–27: this is the third statement that Jesus makes from the Cross.

Slide 9

John 19:25–27, we read, “Now there stood by the cross of Jesus His mother, and His mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene.”

This passage tells us that there are four women; according to John, they are by the cross. I point that out because in the Synoptics, it says they were at a distance. I think that there’s no contradiction here, but they moved there away from their nearness to the cross—for whatever reason—they moved.

The accuracy of the other Gospel writers must not be doubted. They carefully looked—especially Luke, he is a careful historian—he carefully researched what happened. So, we can trust that there’s no contradiction here. They were near, and then they moved away at some distance.

Slide 10

There are four women that are mentioned here

1. Mary, His mother
2. Mary’s sister in John 19:25—His mother’s sister, who should be identified as Salome, the mother of the sons of Zebedee, James, and John.
3. Mary, who is the wife of “Clopas” in John (his name is written as “Cleopas” in Luke 24:18). She’s also identified as the mother of James the Less and of Joses or Joseph—so these are two other disciples.
4. Mary Magdalene.

Mary, His mother, is standing by the cross.

It’s interesting. These four women at the foot of the cross are witnesses to not only His crucifixion, but they are witnesses to His burial, and they are witnesses to His resurrection. They are introduced here as the four women; they’re at the cross.

It’s interesting because in that culture at that time, they thought that the most unreliable of witnesses were women. You just couldn’t trust what they said. “Those women are flighty and they’re hysterical, and you just can’t pay attention to them,” so that’s not a trustworthy thing to rely on a woman.

But that just validates what the Scriptures are teaching, because if you were going to write a fraudulent account, if you are going to make up a story out of whole cloth, then you would choose the most respected people to be your witnesses of what happened.

You wouldn’t write a story about Jesus and have women as the witnesses, because they’re not reliable. That attests to the veracity of Scripture, because this is what happened: the witnesses were women, and they’re reliable. So, if a fraud were writing this, that’s the last thing they would do is identify women as the key witnesses of the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord.

Slide 11

The first woman mentioned is His mother, Mary, and this is a reminder of the prophecy of Simeon in Luke 2. You remember Simeon. There were two. There was Simeon and Hannah. Simeon and Hannah are both very old, very ancient, and they have been given revelation from God that they will witness the Messiah.

So, when Mary and Joseph bring Jesus to the temple for His dedication, as they enter, Simeon comes over. The Holy Spirit somehow informs him that this is the Messiah, and he came over, and we have three or four verses of his blessing upon Mary, Joseph, and his statements about the Lord.

In that he says to Mary, “Behold, this Child is destined for the fall and rising of many in Israel …” The fall, meaning that they would not believe Him, they would reject Him, and they would reject His offer of the kingdom. The rising of course refers to those who would respond and would be saved. “… and for a sign which will be spoken against …” They will speak against Him; this is what has led to the crucifixion. Then He says to her personally,  “(yes, a sword will pierce through your own soul also)”.

Here she stands, the mother of the humanity of our Lord, looking at the cross, looking at her Firstborn, who has been tortured, has been beaten, and is being crucified. We can’t even imagine the thoughts that were going through her head.

How much she comprehended about who He was and His mission is seen in her response when Gabriel first announces that she is going to be pregnant and give birth to the Messiah, but then later, just like others at that time, she’s not real sure who He is.

We can’t grasp this level of certainty and then confusion, unless we look at our own lives, and we know that there are times when we’re absolutely certain of the truth of Scripture, and other times we’re not so sure. That’s part of humanity. Remember, these folks are not indwelt by the Holy Spirit. They didn’t have the filling of the Spirit, like we do, so there’s definitely a difference in their life.

She is standing there witnessing the crucifixion of her Firstborn. Then we know she has a family member there identified by John as His mother’s sister. So, she’s not alone. We don’t know how old she is at this time, but if our Lord is approximately 30 to 35 years of age, then she’s probably in her late 40s to early 50s, probably right around 50. His father Joseph has died by this time, by the time He entered into His public ministry.

Slide 12

Salome is her sister. She’s identified in the Mark passage I have up here, when he lists the women at the cross. Notice he says, “There were also women looking on from afar.” This is later into the three-hour block of darkness, so they had moved away from being right by the cross. They’re listed as “Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the Less and Joses, and Salome.” She’s named there.

Matthew 27:56 says, “… among whom were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joses, and the mother of Zebedee’s sons.”

You have Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James the Less and Joses. They’re mentioned in all three passages.

Mary the mother of Jesus is obviously distinct. She is mentioned in John 19, but there is one who is identified three different ways: Salome, the mother of the sons of Zebedee, and His mother’s sister. This also tells us that James and John are first cousins to Jesus. This is a family affair.

Slide 13

The third person is Mary the wife of “Clopas,” as he’s identified in John, but he’s identified in Luke 24:18 as “Cleopas”. She is also identified as the mother of James the Less and Joses. So, she’s the mother of two disciples.

Cleopas is identified as a disciple in Luke 24:13—not one of the 12. After the resurrection, “Now behold, two of them …”—the “them” refers to His disciples—“… two of them were traveling that same day to a village called Emmaus, which is seven miles from Jerusalem.”

On the way the Lord, having His identity somewhat cloaked, appears to them and begins to talk to them. Then we’re told, “Then the one whose name was Cleopas answered and said to Him ...”

We don’t know much about him; there are only two times he is mentioned in Scripture. However, it’s interesting, we can’t say for sure, but early church tradition—early, early church tradition, going back into the second century—tells us that he was the brother of Joseph. I don’t know that that’s true; I don’t know that it’s not true, but it might have been true.

If it’s true, then you have first cousins among the disciples on His mother’s side, first cousins on His adopted Father’s side. John the Baptist was also a cousin, so this is a family affair. They’re very close. I’ve always found that to be quite interesting.

Slide 14

Then there is Mary Magdalene. There is a lot of confusion about Mary Magdalene. There are people from the Gnostics side that think that somehow she married Jesus and all sorts of nonsense about her, but her second name “Magdalene” means that she is from the village of Magdala, which is on the Sea of Galilee’s western shore.

When I was in Israel the last time, about two years ago, I got an opportunity to go to this archaeological site now that has just been excavated over the last four or five years. Some of the findings that are there, the synagogue that was there, some of the other things, the altar of the synagogue has been found, so it’s quite fascinating. We will be going there for the first time on this coming Israel trip in June [2018].

What we know of her, is that Jesus had cast demons out of her, as described in Luke 8:2. Often she is identified, I think very wrongly, as the sinful woman mentioned in Luke 7:36–50. That has nothing to do with Mary Magdalene. We do not know really that much about her, other than she is there at the cross, the burial, and the resurrection.

Slide 15

John goes on to tell us that with these four women standing there, that Jesus then begins to speak and address Mary, His mother and the Apostle John, who is standing there as well.

As we look at this, this is His third statement from the cross. His previous two statements have been very gracious and related to salvation. He said, when He’s first hung on the cross, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”

Then He says just prior to this, where we ended last time, the second thief on the cross, who said, “Lord, remember me when You come in Your kingdom.” Jesus said I will be with you today in Paradise—indicating the salvation of that second thief.

Now here is a man who has gone through unbelievable beatings and torture and flogging. He has been reviled and ridiculed and blasphemed; He’s been beaten, all kinds of things. His third statement is just as gracious as the other two, but it’s not related to salvation. He is fulfilling His responsibility as a firstborn son. It is His responsibility to see that His mother is taken care of. His Father is no longer there, so He is going to entrust the care of His mother to the disciple whom He loved.

John 19:26, “When Jesus therefore saw His mother, and the disciple whom He loved standing by, He said to His mother, ‘Woman, behold your son!’ ” He is indicating that now John will be her son.

John 19:27, “Then He said to the disciple, ‘behold your mother’! And from that hour that disciple took her to his own home.”

We know from the end of the Gospel of John, that this disciple whom Jesus loved is the one who wrote this Gospel. He is often referred to as the disciple whom Jesus loved, and so that identifies John, and a close relationship with John. John is the youngest of the disciples, so he’s the one who’s most likely to live long enough to take care of Mary.

Also, we know that there is a hint in the prophecy that is stated in John 21, that John will not die as a martyr as the other disciples. Jesus is going to entrust her care to a disciple who is going to grow and mature, but not to one of His natural half-brothers because they’re not believers yet; they are all unbelievers.

He’s going to entrust the care of His mother to someone outside the family who is actually a nephew who is a believer who will take care and who shows care, wisdom, graciousness, and responsibility on the part of a son for his mother.

Slide 16

That ends the first three hours on the Cross, and we come to the second three hours on the Cross, which is focusing on the payment for sin. This takes place between 12 noon and 6 PM, and these are Stages 18 through 23.

These describe the events related to the spiritual death of Christ on the Cross, not His physical death. We will come back next time and look at the events that occurred at the time He died physically and the significance of the death of Christ in its entirety on the Cross.

Slide 17

The Gospels, the Synoptics, are united in their statement about the covering of darkness: that it is from the sixth hour—which is noon on our time—and the ninth hour. There is darkness all over the land.

Mark 15:33 says “darkness over the whole land,” and Luke 23:44, says “over all the earth.”

You notice anything there? Is it land or earth? In Greek it’s the same word in all three verses. My question is, is this talking about the whole earth being covered in darkness or is this just talking about the land of Israel? Basically, the eastern part of the Mediterranean, is that it? I believe it is localized.

I don’t believe it was all of the earth. Nevertheless, as we study what has been unearthed by a variety of apologists, there were those outside of Israel in the eastern part of the Mediterranean that do make comments about an unusual darkness that covered that end of the Mediterranean. Whether they’re talking about the same event, I do have questions.

There is Dionysius, who’s a Greek scientist who lived in Egypt—not that far away—who reported experiencing this darkness while he was in the city of Heliopolis. There is also a second writer, Diogenes, who was also a Greek scientist living in Egypt and commented on the same darkness.

About it he [Dionysius] wrote, “Either the deity himself suffers at this moment or sympathizes with one that does.” Of course, he had no knowledge of who Jesus was or anything else; he just was commenting on the severity of this darkness.

Others have tried to identify this as a solar eclipse. In fact, there is a comment made by Flagon, who was an Egyptian as well who makes a comment about this, identifying it as an eclipse. This was picked up by Origen later on, and Origen used that to substantiate, as an external witness, what transpired at the Cross.

I mentioned this in a lesson in 1 Peter when we were going through apologetics, but as I was studying for this lesson, I ran across a quotation from Alfred Edersheim who wrote a huge volume on The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, and he raises some doubt about Flagon’s comment.

Once I read that, because in Origen, he doesn’t identify the year or some other things, but Edersheim does. He identifies it as the year 29, which is four years off. He also says that Flagon identifies this as having occurred in the fall, in November, which is the wrong time of year. So that is not a valid source to go to.

Furthermore, he identifies it as a solar eclipse, and I pointed this out before, it can’t be a solar eclipse because it’s Passover. Passover is always on a full moon. You can’t have a solar eclipse when you have a full moon because the moon is on the other side of the earth. To have an eclipse, the moon has to be between the earth and the sun.

For those reasons, I don’t think that’s a valid reference, but it raises some questions about the others, because they don’t give enough detail in terms of year or other circumstances to be able to truly substantiate that that is the exact time of when they are speaking.

However, there is another statement that is made by Thallus in AD 52—this is some 19 years after the Cross. He wrote a history of the Eastern Mediterranean civilization from the Trojan War to his own time. He cites another work by Julius Africanus, who asserted that on the whole world there pressed the most fearful darkness, and the rocks were rent by an earthquake in many places in Judea, and other districts were thrown down. This darkness, Thallus, in his third book of his history calls an event that was without reason and not necessarily an eclipse of the sun. They didn’t know what it was. That may be a valid witness outside of the Bible for this darkness.

Slide 18

But what is more important as we look at this is why the darkness covered the face of the earth. Is this the face of just Israel or is it the face the world? I think it is just the face of Israel because we must understand the purpose for it.

In fact, I looked at one commentary, a well-known, well-respected author listed six different reasons that people have put forth for why the darkness covered the earth, and he didn’t list the correct reason. I thought, I can’t believe he missed that, because it’s a popular view. He just left it out.

Slide 19

Why did God cover the land in darkness? It’s a time of judgment. Darkness is frequently associated with judgment in the Scripture.

In Isaiah 5:20, Isaiah 60:20, Joel 2:10, Joel 2:30–31, and Amos 8:9. The last three references all relate to darkness at the time of the Day of the Lord at the end of the Tribulation. The first two reference the Tribulation. I could’ve listed five pages of references to substantiate this.

Slide 20

1. Darkness indicates judgment, and there is a judgment that is taking place on the Cross.
2. During this time Jesus is judged: He is judicially separated from the Father and the Father imputes our sins to Christ on the Cross.

Some people would say, “Well, how does this happen?” It’s got to be judicial because in the Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are eternally united forever. You can’t separate ontologically in terms of their very being. You can’t come in and separate any Member of the Trinity from the whole because of Their eternal union. What we have here is a judicial separation.

Slide 21

Now let’s develop this a little more.

3. This is during the time that Jesus takes the baptism of the cup.

He had prophesied that He would, when He talks to James and John—when Mama Salome wants to get them elevated to sit on His right and left hand in the kingdom—He says, “Can they drink the cup that I will drink?” This is the cup that He is drinking. It’s the call the “baptism of the cup” because He’s being identified with the cup.

Often God’s judgment in the Old Testament is portrayed as God pouring out judgment from a cup, so that’s the imagery that’s there. He’s being identified with the wrath of God: not in His deity, but in His humanity.

We have to be careful when we say that because too many times it’s been poorly articulated. Remember the definition of the hypostatic union: that is the union of humanity and deity together in one Person.

The thirsting of Christ, as we’ll see in a minute, is evidence of His humanity. He thirsted. Deity doesn’t thirst. But the Person, the united Person, thirsts because it’s one Person on the Cross.

You can’t come in and split Him in two, which was the error of some of the early church Fathers, as they were trying to figure out how the humanity and the deity of Christ related together.

The Person of Christ, that one Person on the Cross, deity and humanity united together in one Person suffers. But it is His humanity that is receiving the judgment of sin, because God doesn’t substitute for human beings: humanity does.

It is the humanity of our Lord that is our substitute and salvation, not deity. Deity doesn’t pay for sins. Humanity pays for sins. Like must substitute for like. It’s during this time that He is identified with our sins and receives the judgment of God.

Slide 22

2 Corinthians 5:21 talks about that: “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”

Slide 23

4. It is His humanity not His deity that receives that imputation of sin.

It is a judicial act and a judicial separation from God, and separation from God is how we define what concept? Spiritual death. It’s not the physical death of Jesus on the Cross. It is His spiritual death, when He is separated from the Father judicially because He becomes sin judicially in our place and for us. That is the transaction on the Cross.

This is completed before He dies physically. In fact, there are some other things that happen here that are quite interesting. Just little hints that must be explained in terms and are understood in terms of what I’m teaching here.

Slide 24

5. The separation from the Father is spiritual death. So, Jesus is paying the penalty for sin, our spiritual death, before He dies physically.

That takes us all the way back to what I’ve taught many, many times in Genesis 2 about the legal penalty. The Father said you can eat from any tree in the Garden except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And if you eat from that, you will die. That wasn’t physical death, it is spiritual death. That’s what happened immediately when God came to walk in the Garden. After they ate of the fruit, they ran and hid. They’re separated from the Father.

What God outlines in Genesis 3 with regard to the hostility between the woman and the serpent—the serpent crawling on the ground, the power struggle between the wife and the husband, the fact that thorns and thistles will come forth from the earth and man will earn his living now by the sweat of his brow—those are all consequences of spiritual death.

The last thing that is stated is “… from the dust you came, to dust you will return.” That’s physical death. Physical death is the last, the greatest, and the most significant of the consequences of spiritual death. But those are the consequences, not the penalty.

The penalty is separation from God. That’s what I say when we go through the Lord’s Table every time, is that the cup is a picture of shed blood, which is a picture of death—not physical death, but spiritual death, the time when He pays the penalty for sin on the Cross.

Slide 25

This is seen even more in the next statement, which is Stage 19, the fourth statement from the Cross.

Matthew 27:46, “And about the ninth hour …”—so three hours have gone by, and we’re not told of anything that happens in those three hours other than there is darkness, and near the end of that three-hour period—“… Jesus cries out with a loud voice …”—He screams out and He says in Aramaic—‘Eli, Eli, lama, sabachthani?’ that is, ‘My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?’ ” 

This is taken from Psalm 22:1. It’s the first line of that song, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? Why are You so far from helping Me, and from the words of my groaning?”

At this time in the history of the Bible, there are no chapter divisions; there are no verse divisions. If you talked to a Jew at that time about the 22^nd Psalm, He wouldn’t know what you’re talking about. You would refer to that Psalm as “Eli, Eli, lama, sabachthani.” That’s the title of the song.

It’s just like the title of Genesis in the Hebrew Bible is Barasheet. That’s the very first word in Genesis 1:1, “Barasheet bara Elohim—In the beginning God created.” So, the title of the Book was “In the beginning.”

Now, if Jesus is said to have said, “Eli, Eli, Lama, sabachthani,” it’s very likely He didn’t just quote that. What the writer is saying is He quoted that Psalm. He recites the entire Psalm 22, with all of its Messianic prophecies. It’s the second most important Messianic prophecy in the Old Testament second only to Isaiah 53.

Slide 26

The words there in both Greek and Hebrew indicate leaving something behind, deserting something, forsaking. It can have the context of just every day events: somebody leaves somebody, abandons something. Or can have a judicial connotation of being forsaken legally. It could be used in the case of a divorce or desertion or abandonment.

Again, it emphasizes that there is a judicial separation that takes place between the Father and the Son.

The other thing that we should note here because for many years a number of pastors have mistakenly stated this—that when Jesus said, “My God, My God,” “My God” the first time is the Father; “My God,” the second time is the Spirit—so He is being abandoned by the other two Members of the Trinity. You may have heard that.

However, when you go on to read it, it says, “Why have You forsaken Me?” The “You” is not a second person plural. He’s not saying, “My God, My God, why have Y’all forsaken me?” He is saying, “My God, My God, why have You (singular) forsaken Me?”

He’s talking to God the Father because God the Father is the judge. He’s not talking about God the Holy Spirit because God the Holy Spirit is sustaining Him throughout this time on the Cross. It is important to make those distinctions and correct maybe some misunderstanding.

Slide 27

Then we come to the 20^th stage, the reaction of the bystanders, and this is really the eighth mocking that takes place. Look at what happens.

“Some of those who stood there when they heard Him say, ‘Eli, Eli, lama, sabachthani,’ they said, ‘He’s calling for Elijah!’ and immediately one of them ran and took a sponge, filled it with sour wine or vinegar, put it on a read and offered it to Him to drink. The rest said, ‘Let Him alone; let’s see if Elijah will come and save Him.’ ”

See, that’s the mocking: “Well, He thinks Elijah is going to save Him. He’s calling on Elijah. Wait, let’s don’t give Him anything to drink.” That’s the eighth mocking.

What’s interesting here is, why would they mistake Eli for Eliyyahu? Maybe they think it’s a shortened form of Elijah, and that is because in pop Judaism—Judaism on the street—was just as misinformed, ill-informed, and confused as pop Christianity that flows through the pews of most churches in America. Nobody takes enough time to really read what the text says.

They didn’t read what the text said, they just had this common view that Elijah is going to be coming back before the Messiah comes and before the end, that it has something to do with pop eschatology, and so that’s what they’re thinking, “He’s calling upon Elijah. Elijah will show up. This will bring the end of the world, and He’ll get rescued from the Cross.”

That’s how they’ve misunderstood this within their popular misinformed eschatology. We’ve seen a couple of passages back earlier in Matthew 17:9–13, where they also demonstrate there the same kind of misunderstanding and misidentification of Elijah, when it was related to John the Baptist.

This is their reaction: they’re just mocking Jesus. It’s not too different from what was said earlier, “He saved others; now let Him save Himself.” They just keep running that same basic theme.

Slide 28

Then we come to the 21^st stage. This is the fifth statement from the Cross.

In John 19:28 we read, “After this, Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, said, ‘I thirst.’ ”

Something interesting happens here. The three hours are up. Jesus has paid the penalty for sin. How do we know that? We will come back to this in the next statement, but John says, “… knowing that all things were now accomplished …”

The Greek word is TETELESTAI, which means it’s finished, it’s complete. This is the same word Jesus uses a couple of verses later when He says, “It is finished.” John uses that word twice so that you get the point that by this point everything had transpired to complete the transaction of payment for sin.

Something else has taken place here. When we go back to the quote from Psalm 22, Jesus calls upon God and He says, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”

The interesting thing is throughout Jesus’ ministry, He referred to God as His Father. He referred to God as His Father over 150 times, and of those 150 times, there were at least 45 times (the reason I say “about” is because the computer programs differ, the search is a little different, what some people have written is a little different, so I’m going to generalize it).

Of the total, it’s 150 to maybe 170 times, and of those, 45 to 50 times it’s “My Father.” Jesus has that personal relationship with God the Father, but here this is the only time He refers to Him as My God, showing that that fellowship, that intimacy is broken because of spiritual death. That’s going to change now, as we will see.

Now that it’s over, John makes a statement, “It’s been completed,” and now Jesus speaks again. Up to this point, from the time that He talked about Mary to John, He hasn’t said anything. Now He’s saying, “I thirst.” He cried out to God in the fourth statement, and now in the fifth statement He is going to talk, and He says, “I thirst.”

This indicates the true humanity of Jesus. It also indicates that He is physically on the Cross. What do I mean by that?

Well, the heresy developed by the early second century, called Docetism, is from the Greek word DOKEIN, which means to appear, and they said, “Jesus wasn’t really physically—it was a form of a gnostic heresy—wasn’t physically dying because He couldn’t physically die. It just appeared that He did.

No, this shows us that the true humanity of Jesus is on the Cross and He thirsted. So, it gives us another example that the Scripture recognizes the humanity of Jesus is on the Cross.

Slide 29

Then they give Him vinegar. Matthew 27:48, “Immediately one of them ran and took a sponge, filled it with sour wine”—and the word there is really vinegar. This was not the same as what was offered to Him at the beginning with the mixture of myrrh or gall. That was used as an anesthetic to dull the pain.

This is not the same. This was typically a drink that Roman soldiers would have in order to quench their thirst, and so this is what is given to Jesus. It’s offered for Him to drink, and He does. That’s why there’s this vessel. John 19:29 says there’s a “vessel full of sour wine [or vinegar] sitting there; and they filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on hyssop, and put it to His mouth.”

Slide 30

Then we come to the sixth statement; this is where we will end this morning in John 19:30. We saw this same word, I have it on the slide there in two verses earlier in John 19:28, “So when Jesus had received the sour wine …”—He drank it. 

Why did He drink it? After all of this, His mouth is probably parched; He’s thirsty. He is getting ready to make one of the most significant statements of all history. He has something to “wet His whistle” as it were, to get rid of the dry mouth, and He can yell out “TETELESTAI! It’s accomplished, it’s paid in full.”

We have discovered through archaeological remains of documents that on receipts, when someone paid the bill, what they would stamp on it was TETELESTAI, paid in full. It’s done.

He’s still alive physically. It was accomplished. TETELESTAI is a perfect tense verb, and that means it has already been accomplished. When He says it, it’s completed, so it’s not it is being accomplished or it is being finished. Any kind of continuative idea is no longer present. It has already been completed with results that will go on forever.

Twice the Apostle John uses this word, so we get the point, that the death of Christ isn’t something that goes on and on and on. Totally negates the whole idea in a Roman Catholic mass where Jesus is re-crucified each time the mass takes place. No, it is completed. It’s finished. It’s done. Nothing can be added to it. Nothing helps.

That’s why the gospel is believe on the Lord Jesus Christ alone. It’s not believe and do something better. You can’t help it. In fact, if you add something to the gospel, you destroy the gospel. There’s no salvation in faith plus. Anything you add to faith destroys faith because then you’re relying on something other than Christ alone for salvation and His sufficient work on the Cross.

That’s what sufficient means. It was enough because it was paid in full. What we learn from Colossians 2:12–14 is that when that happens, the financial transaction is the canceling of the debt against us, so that our sin is canceled. We’re forgiven—all mankind—the sin debt is canceled.

What remains, though, is that we have to trust in Him and believe on Him. That is why it is incumbent upon every person to make that decision to believe in Jesus or you will not have eternal life.

Closing Prayer

“Father, thank You for this opportunity to go step-by-step through the events of the Cross; the events, the sayings, understanding their significance, probing the depth of what transpired there, this transaction that is beyond our comprehension, that our sin, not in part as the hymn says, “not in part, but the whole,” was paid for, canceled, paid in full. Nothing more need be done.

“Sin is no longer the issue. No matter how bad our sin has been, it is not the issue. It has been paid for. The issue now is: do we accept Your free gift of salvation? Do you believe that Jesus died on the Cross for your sins?

“The moment you think, ‘I believe that’s true,’—when you agree that that is true for you—at that instant, God cleanses you from sin positionally, He imputes to you righteousness. You are declared justified, and you have been bought with a price. You are truly redeemed by faith alone in Christ alone.

“We pray, Father, that anyone listening to this message would know that their salvation is not dependent upon anything that they do, but totally, completely, sufficiently by Christ’s death on the Cross.

“For those of us who are already believers, we must realize that what this means for us is that we are now Yours. We have been sealed by the Spirit at the instant of faith, we have Your brand on us. We have been bought with a price, and now we are to live for You.

“Father, we pray that we might be responsive to that challenge. In Christ’s name. Amen.”